On that day came to him Sadducees, who say there is no resurrection; and they demanded of him,
The Pharisees and Herodians had just questioned Jesus and gone away silenced. On the same day a rival party stepped forward, and Matthew labels them by what they deny: there is no resurrection.
Their denial went further than the resurrection alone.
After the Pharisees, the Sadducees were the best-known group among the Jews. The Pharisees won converts, but the Sadducees kept to themselves, so they stayed fewer in number. They did not believe in the resurrection, or in angels, or in spirits. They held that the soul died with the body. Matt. 22:23; Acts 4:1-2; Acts 23:8. They kept strictly to the written law of Moses, but they rejected the traditions of the elders, known as the oral law.
They also held the powerful posts, which shaped how and when they chose to fight.
The Sadducees were a religious party too, but they stood for the worldly side of religion. The high offices of the temple fell to them, along with a leading part in public affairs (Acts 4, 5)... So it makes sense that they did not clash with our Lord as constantly and openly as the Pharisees did. Yet they fiercely opposed the power of the Spirit and the witness to the resurrection that the apostles later gave.
The words "the same day" set this question inside a run of attacks. Three very different groups found one point of agreement.
The three great parties, Pharisees, Herodians and Sadducees, join together in this. Ritualists, worldly men and rationalists make common cause to defeat the Lord. They are deeply different, yet they unite in this one thing: rejecting the Lord... The Pharisees came first and sent their disciples to Him with the Herodians. After He had answered their very clever question, the Sadducees appeared. They too had to go back silenced.
The two leading parties had gone wrong in opposite directions.
At that time religion was torn between its two main groups, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The Pharisees had left the truth by way of formalism, the Sadducees by way of unbelief... The Sadducees hoped to disprove certain divine teachings by hinting that they were absurd... He convicts the Sadducees by showing them how ignorant they were of the word they were insulting.
Their question was not an argument from Scripture. It was mockery dressed as a puzzle.
The Sadducees were the materialists of that day. They stood for the unbelief of the flesh. It has been well said, "The strength of unbelief lies in raising difficulties, in inventing imaginary cases that do not apply, and in reasoning from the things of men to the things of God." (W. K.). So here these wicked men try to oppose the truth by ridicule... If God had no power, the resurrection itself would be impossible.
The same weapon is still in use, and a Christian should not pick it up.
For the Christian, ridicule is a dangerous weapon. Whoever uses it may find himself in strange company. It has always been the favourite weapon of the unbeliever who sets out to oppose Christianity... The Sadducees did not try to prove the resurrection false from Scripture. They opposed it by ridicule.
Their case assumed that the next life simply carries on this one.
They put forward a case which, if their foolish idea were true, would make the resurrection ridiculous and impossible. For they assume that the relationships and conditions of this world carry on into the next. This is what men do. They mix their own thoughts in with God's word, and because those thoughts do not agree with it, they decide it makes no sense and reject it.
Behind "no resurrection" lies something bleaker. They believed the person himself is simply gone.
For the Sadducees the "dead" were simply wiped out. Denying that the person lives on was the natural root of denying the resurrection... Their denial was thorough. For a Sadducee the words "I am the God of Abraham," spoken to Moses at the burning bush, could only be mockery. Abraham was a shadow that had passed away, with no hope of return. The God of someone who no longer exists — what comfort or blessing was there in that?
- Named by denial. Matthew introduces the Sadducees by what they refused: no resurrection, no angels, no spirits, and a soul that dies with the body.
- Denial breeds ridicule. They had no Scripture for their view, so they mocked the truth with an invented case instead of disproving it.
- Ridicule needs allies. Very different groups — ritualists, worldly men, rationalists — joined in one thing: rejecting the Lord.
- Allies still lose. Each party came forward in turn, and each went away silenced. They mixed their own thoughts with God's word, then threw out what did not fit.
- The loss is God Himself. If the dead are simply wiped out, then "I am the God of Abraham" is empty words, and no comfort or blessing is left in it.
saying, Teacher, Moses said, If any one die, not having children, his brother shall marry his wife and shall raise up seed to his brother.
The Sadducees come to Jesus quoting Moses: a childless man's brother must marry the widow and continue his family line. They deny the resurrection, so they use Scripture itself against a truth they have already ruled out.
The men asking the question belonged to a group known for what it denied.
Next to the Pharisees, the Sadducees were the most prominent sect of the Jews. The Pharisees made converts. The Sadducees were much more exclusive, so they stayed fewer in number. They did not believe in the resurrection, or in angels, or in spirits. They held that the soul died with the body. Matt. 22:23; Acts 4:1-2; Acts 23:8. They were strict about the written law of Moses. But they rejected the traditions of the elders, known as the oral law.
They credit the words to Moses himself, and other Gospel passages speak the same way.
The New Testament goes further, and states plainly that the books were written by Moses. In Matt. 22:24 the Jews said to our Lord, "Moses said." In John 8:5 they said, "In the Law Moses commanded us." Mark 12:19 and Luke 20:28 record the words, "Moses wrote for us." The Lord, in His reply, confirms this view of the authorship of the law, saying, "Have you not read in the book of Moses?" (Mark 12:26).
The rule they cite protected a dead man's family name in Israel.
There was a merciful provision in the law (Deut. 25:5-10) that no man's family should be allowed to die out, while a brother survived to continue the line. In Israel, to be childless was a disgrace. A man's name wiped out — his family gone — counted as a special mark of God's displeasure. The Sadducees of our Lord's day might use this merciful provision to ridicule the truth of resurrection. They only showed their ignorance of "the Scriptures and the power of God." God had made it for life on earth, not for the life to come. His provision also seems to recognise the hope in every Hebrew woman's heart, that through her the promise of "the woman's seed" might somehow be fulfilled. That hope came true literally in the family line kept alive through Ruth.
Their appeal to Moses was a pose, and the Lord saw straight through it.
Unbelief is as false and dishonest as pretended human righteousness. The Pharisees could join with the Herodians and pretend loyalty to Caesar. In the same way the sceptical Sadducees could plead Moses, as if the inspired word had full authority over their conscience! But the Lord laid bare the hypocrisy of those who stood high in religion. He saw too what the sceptic never suspects. Their difficulties flow not only from overlooking the power of God, but from plain ignorance, however high their opinion of themselves.
Unbelief has a method, and this question follows it exactly.
The Sadducees were the materialists of that day. They stood for the unbelief of the flesh. One writer put it well: "The strength of unbelief lies in putting difficulties, in raising up imaginary cases that do not apply, in reasoning from the things of men to the things of God." So in this case these wicked men seek to oppose the truth by ridicule. They raise an imaginary case which they judge shows the absurdity of resurrection. As usual with unbelievers, they show gross ignorance of Scripture and ignore the power of God. If Scripture had said that people marry after the resurrection, their imaginary case might indeed have raised a difficulty. If God had no power, the resurrection itself would be impossible.
Unlike the Pharisees, these men were not building a legal case against Him.
The Pharisees, as we have seen, wanted a charge against Him. They hoped to accuse Him before the religious or the civil court. The Sadducees had no such intention. Whatever His answer would be, it would not have given them ground for a prosecution. They knew, too, that He taught the resurrection (John 5:28-29). The form of their question showed it. But if they could ask a question He could not answer well, what a triumph that would be!
- Moses quoted — They begin with "Moses said." The Lord's reply treats those words as written by Moses himself.
- Moses misused — The law they cite kept a family name alive on earth. It said nothing about life after death.
- Moses mocked — Their creed had no resurrection, no angel and no spirit. So they invent a case to make resurrection look absurd.
- Moses' God unknown — Their difficulty had two roots. They did not know the Scriptures, and they left out the power of God.
- Moses answered — They wanted a question He could not answer. Instead the very books they claimed to honour exposed them.
Now there were with us seven brethren; and the first having married died, and not having seed, left his wife to his brother.
The verse sits inside a story the Sadducees made up. Seven brothers marry the same woman in turn, and not one leaves a child. It is not history. It is a test case, built to make the resurrection look ridiculous — and the whole puzzle rests on one hidden assumption.
The men who come to Jesus here are not seeking an answer. One writer sets out both their beliefs and their motive.
They were the materialists of their day. They denied the resurrection and the existence of angels or spirits (Acts 23:8). They probably cared little about His teaching. They seem to have turned to firm opposition only when the Apostles "preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead" (Acts 4:2). This time they saw the Pharisees silenced, and we may believe they were not sorry to see their rivals defeated. So they came to the Lord with what we may call a test case, which to their minds settled it: resurrection was impossible… But if they could put a question He could not answer well, how great their triumph would be!
They were hunting a triumph, not the truth.
The passing of the widow from brother to brother was not invented. Israel's law made it a duty.
The rule in Deuteronomy 25 teaches us that an Israelite had to marry his brother's widow if that brother had died childless. He had to raise up a child for his brother, so that the firstborn of that marriage kept the dead brother's name and inheritance safe. If a man refused this service to his dead brother, he faced public shame, and a mark of disgrace stayed on him.
That law had a purpose, and the purpose is exactly what the Sadducees overlooked.
The law made a merciful provision (Deuteronomy 25:5-10). No man's family was to die out while a brother was still alive to carry on the line. In Israel, to have no children was a disgrace… In our Lord's day the Sadducees might use this merciful rule to mock the truth of resurrection, but they only showed their ignorance of "the Scriptures and the power of God." God made that provision for life on earth, not for the life to come.
Why seven brothers, and not two? The number is piled up on purpose.
They imagine a case of seven brothers who die one after another, each in turn having had the same wife. In the resurrection, they ask, which man would have her? Of course, if only two men had had her, they could have asked the same question. But they wanted to make the truth of resurrection look as ridiculous as they could.
One writer names the method.
Someone has truly said, "The strength of unbelief lies in raising difficulties, in inventing imaginary cases that do not apply, and in reasoning from the things of men to the things of God." So here these wicked men try to fight the truth with ridicule… If Scripture had said that people marry in the resurrection state, their invented case would indeed have been a difficulty. If God had no power, the resurrection itself would be impossible.
The whole puzzle only works if the next world runs on the rules of this one.
They put forward a case which, if their foolish idea were true, would make the resurrection ridiculous and impossible. For they assume that the relationships and the state of this world carry on into the next. This is what men do: they mix their own thoughts in with God's word, and since those thoughts do not agree with it, they decide it makes no sense and reject it.
He does not argue about the seven brothers at all. He points to what God said to Moses about the patriarchs — the forefathers of Israel, long dead.
The patriarchs had died out of the world of men, but they were living in God's presence. That guaranteed a resurrection at God's appointed hour. It would also be a resurrection that brings them into a new and heavenly order of things. Notice too that the Lord spoke of that statement as "spoken to you." What God said to Moses holds good for everyone, and for all time.
- Motive. The seven brothers are an invented case, not a report. The Sadducees denied the resurrection and wanted a question no one could answer.
- Method. Their weapon is ridicule, not Scripture. Two husbands would have raised the same problem, so they piled up seven.
- Mistake. The law of Deuteronomy 25 was mercy for life on earth. It guarded a family name and inheritance. They turned it into a rule for eternity.
- Root. They assumed this world's relationships carry over into the next. Then they rejected God's word because it did not match their thoughts.
- Answer. Jesus answered from Scripture and the power of God. The patriarchs live before Him, and what God said to Moses stands for all time.
In like manner also the second and the third, unto the seven.
The Sadducees have quoted the law of Moses about a childless widow, and now they run their story through all seven brothers. Why stack the case so high, and what answer did they think the Lord could not give?
The men putting this case were not honest enquirers.
They were the materialists of their day. They denied the resurrection and the existence of angels or spirits (Acts 23:8). They probably took little notice of His teaching. They seem to have been stirred into determined opposition only when the Apostles "preached through Jesus the resurrection from the dead" (Acts 4:2)… They came to the Lord with what we may call a test case, which to their minds settled that resurrection was impossible… But if they could put a question that He could not answer well, how great their triumph would be.
Seven brothers make the story vivid, but the argument would work just as well with two.
They imagine a case of seven brothers who die, each in turn having had the same wife. In the resurrection, they ask, which man will have her? Of course, if only two had married her they could have asked the same question. But they wanted to make the truth of resurrection look as ridiculous as they could.
Commentators doubt that these seven marriages ever happened.
The law on this point was far from being practised in those days, and the men who interpreted it had put all kinds of limits on it. A case like the one the Sadducees describe may of course be possible. But it is unlikely that the case they put before Him was real. It was no doubt made up for the occasion. Ignorance, unbelief and sarcasm prompted this question.
Unbelief always works this way. It invents a case, then judges God by it.
As one writer has said, "The strength of unbelief lies in raising difficulties, in inventing imaginary cases which do not apply, in reasoning from the things of men to the things of God." So here these wicked men try to oppose the truth by ridicule. They raise an imaginary case which, in their view, shows that resurrection is absurd… If Scripture had said that people marry in the resurrection state, their imaginary case might really have been a difficulty. If God had no power, the resurrection itself would be impossible.
The rule about marrying a brother's widow said nothing about the world to come. It was a mercy for family life on earth.
The law made a merciful provision (Deut. 25:5-10) that no man's family should be allowed to die out while a brother was still alive to carry on the line. In Israel, being childless was a disgrace. For a man's name to be wiped out — his family to die out — counted as a special mark of God's displeasure. In our Lord's day the Sadducees might try to ridicule the truth of resurrection by bringing in this merciful provision, but they only showed their ignorance of "the Scriptures and the power of God." God had made this provision for the present life on earth, not for the life to come.
Their puzzle only worked if life after resurrection copied life now. The Lord traced their mistake to two roots, and both are still at work today.
"You are wrong," was His plain word, and He pointed to the source of their error. They knew neither the Scriptures, which they claimed to explain, nor the power of the God whom they claimed to serve. This double error lies under all modern religious unbelief. First, people often misquote the Scriptures and always misunderstand them. Second, in their minds God is so stripped of His power and glory that endless difficulties arise. Admit His power, and the difficulties disappear.
His reply went to Moses — the very part of Scripture they claimed as their authority.
In this Gospel the one point is that the dead rise, because God declared Himself to be the God of the fathers even after their death. And He is plainly not the God of the dead — the extinct, as the Sadducees thought — but of the living. If He was their God in that condition when He spoke to Moses, He would have to be the God of the dead, something the Sadducees had been the first to deny. It mattered all the more that He revealed Himself this way to Moses. The whole system of the law came through Moses, and the Sadducees claimed to hold to it.
- Made-up. Seven brothers, one wife, no children — a case built for the moment, not one anyone remembered.
- Motive. Two brothers would have raised the same puzzle. They piled up seven to make resurrection look ridiculous.
- Method. Unbelief invents cases that do not apply, and reasons from human things to divine ones.
- Mistake. They took a law meant to keep an earthly family name alive and applied it to the world to come.
- Missing. Two things: the Scriptures and the power of God. Admit God's power, and the difficulty disappears.
And last of all the woman also died.
The Sadducees' story ends with a funeral: seven brothers buried, and then the widow herself. That last death is the point of the whole tale. It leaves a woman with seven lawful husbands and no one alive to claim her. They built the story that way so resurrection would look ridiculous.
The men who told this story invented it. Their method is the standard tactic of unbelief: raise a case that cannot happen, and let ridicule do the arguing.
The Sadducees were the materialists of that day. They represented the unbelief of the flesh. One writer said it well: "The strength of unbelief lies in putting difficulties, in raising up imaginary cases which do not apply, in reasoning from the things of men to the things of God." So here these wicked men try to oppose the truth by ridicule. They raise an imaginary case which they think shows how absurd resurrection is.
Commentators differ on how sincere the questioners were. One writer allows that their question was "more honest, as it would seem, than that of the Pharisees" — yet still shows "ignorance both of the Scriptures and the power of God."
Their whole case rests on a law about keeping a dead man's family line alive. That law had a purpose, and it was not the world to come.
The law made a merciful provision. No man's family should die out while a brother was alive to carry on the line. In Israel, being childless was a disgrace. If a man's name was wiped out and his family died out, people saw it as a special mark of God's displeasure. The Sadducees in our Lord's day might use this merciful provision to ridicule the truth of resurrection. But they only showed their ignorance of "the Scriptures and the power of God." God made this provision for life on earth, not for the life to come.
The Lord does not untangle their puzzle. He names what is missing from the minds that built it.
He lays bare both their ignorance of the Scripture and the power of God... They did not believe the Scriptures were the God-breathed Word... In a few words the Lord affirms the truth of resurrection and the existence of angels, which they denied. He shows that their earthbound imaginations came straight from their earthbound hearts.
Their story rests on a hidden assumption: whatever is true here must still be true there.
If their foolish assumption were true, the case they present would make resurrection ridiculous and impossible. They assume that the relationships and the state of this world continue in the other. This is what people do. They mix their own thoughts in with God's word. Those thoughts do not agree with it, so they decide it makes no sense and reject it.
Marriage belongs to earth for a reason. That reason is the very thing their story kept repeating: death.
The Sadducees of that day could imagine nothing different from what they already knew. Many people since have been the same. Here marriages take place. So in their thinking, if there was a resurrection, people must marry up there too. Their conclusion was false. Marriages do not take place among the saints in heaven. And the Lord gives the reason: "neither can they die any more." Death does not reign there. So marriage has no place on high, since marriage is what keeps the human race going on earth.
Their tale closes with everyone in the grave. The Lord's answer reaches back to three men who had been in the grave for centuries.
The Lord at once turned them to the Scriptures, and to the books of Moses... What God said was, "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob." When He said this, these men had been dead for centuries. Had they then stopped existing? No — otherwise God would have said, "I was their God." He is not the God of the dead, of people who do not exist, but of the living. In this memorable answer the Lord proved that those who are dead to this present life live in the next. He also gave special emphasis to this: each person keeps his own individuality.
- Weapon — The seven-husband story was ridicule dressed as a question. That is the classic move of unbelief: raise an imaginary case that does not apply.
- Wrong text — The law they quoted was God's mercy for keeping a family name alive on earth. It says nothing about the life to come.
- Wrong measure — They assumed the relationships of this world carry on unchanged in the next. People still mix their own thoughts into God's word, then reject whatever will not fit.
- Wrong ending — Marriage fills the gaps that death makes; where no one can die any more, that need is gone.
- Right answer — Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had been dead for centuries, yet God still called Himself their God. He is the God of the living, and each of them is still himself.
In the resurrection therefore of which of the seven shall she be wife, for all had her?
Seven brothers, one wife, and every one of them dead. The Sadducees finish the story with the question they think settles everything: in the resurrection, whose wife will she be?
The question does not come from a curious individual. It comes from a party with a settled method.
Religion advances to the controversy. At that time it was split between two main sects, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. The first had left the truth by way of formalism, the second by way of unbelief. Representatives of each now come forward in turn before the Lord, each with a question suited to their own error... The Sadducees hoped to disprove certain divine doctrines by hinting that they were absurd.
The law behind the story was real. The story itself may not have been.
The Sadducees denied both the resurrection and the existence of angels. They did not believe a word of what they were asking. There was also a sneer at the Pharisees in their words. The question rests on the divine law given through Moses in Deuteronomy (chapter 25:5 and following). However, that law was hardly practised in those days, and its interpreters had placed all kinds of limits on it. A case like theirs is of course possible. But it is unlikely they were laying a real one before Him. It was no doubt made up for the occasion. Ignorance, unbelief and sarcasm prompted this question.
There is a warning here for anyone who argues the same way.
For the Christian, ridicule is a dangerous weapon. Anyone who resorts to it may find himself in strange company. It has always been the favourite weapon of the unbeliever who sets himself against Christianity. In Matthew 22:23-33 the unbelieving Sadducees come to the Lord to prove that resurrection is impossible. They suppose a case which, they imagined, made resurrection absurd. They did not try to prove it false from Scripture; they opposed it with ridicule.
Their trap rests on an assumption they never state.
They present a case that makes the resurrection ridiculous and impossible — if what their folly imagined were true. They suppose that the relationships and the state of this world continue in the next. This is what people do. They mix their own thoughts in with God's word. Then, because those thoughts do not agree with it, they decide it makes no sense and reject it.
The question does have an answer. One writer also spots something odd: the argument borrows the very resurrection it denies.
All the apparent strength of unbelief lies in raising difficulties, in inventing imaginary cases that do not apply, in reasoning from the things of men to the things of God. The whole basis is false assumption... As for difficulties, what are they to the power of God, supposing man had any? What is beyond man's power and imagination is quite possible for God... The question also took the resurrection for granted, which was exactly what they denied... Whose would this woman be, who had the seven husbands one after another? The answer is, she would belong to none of them then. There is no such thing as taking up earthly ties again in the resurrection. People do not rise from the dead as husbands and wives, parents and children, masters or servants.
The Lord's reply also overturns a second plank of their unbelief.
The Lord answers their question first, and then rebukes the unbelief that produced it. He answers the question with a simple statement. In it He contradicts another article of their unbelieving creed — that there are no angels (Acts 23:8). It was enough to meet an argument drawn from their ignorance with His own perfect knowledge. Angels there were, and in the resurrection the saints would be like them, neither marrying nor giving in marriage. They did not know the power of God, and could imagine nothing more than a repeat of earthly conditions. Their confusion was only the fruit of their own fleshly imaginations.
- The askers. The Sadducees had left the truth by the road of unbelief, and hoped to sink a doctrine by making it look absurd.
- The trap. Their story leaned on a real law of Moses, but the case looks invented for the moment. Ignorance, unbelief and sarcasm drove it.
- The error. Unbelief's strength is only apparent. It invents difficulties and reasons from the things of men to the things of God, assuming the next world repeats this one.
- The answer. She would belong to none of them. The resurrection does not take up earthly ties again, and the raised are like the angels the Sadducees denied.
- The lesson. A question meant to mock the resurrection gave the Lord His opening to show what resurrection is.
And Jesus answering said to them, Ye err, not knowing the scriptures nor the power of God.
The Sadducees denied the resurrection, and they brought Jesus a riddle about a woman who married seven brothers in turn. He does not start with their puzzle; He names two things they do not know.
The Sadducees quote Moses as though Scripture ruled their conscience. Yet they deny the very thing they ask about. One writer compares them with the Pharisees:
Unbelief is as false and dishonest as pretended human righteousness. The Pharisees could join with the Herodians and pretend loyalty to Caesar. In the same way the sceptical Sadducees could quote Moses, as if the inspired word had full authority over their conscience! But the Lord laid bare the hypocrisy of those who stood high as religious men. He also saw what the sceptic never suspects. Their difficulties flow not only from overlooking the power of God, but from plain ignorance, whatever their self-conceit may be. Faith, on the contrary, sees clearly, just as it counts on God according to the revelation of Himself in the Word.
The Lord names two failures, and they are not the same failure twice.
He did this and convicted them of their folly; but before doing so He revealed its underlying causes. They did not know the Scriptures — that was ignorance. They did not know the power of God — that was unbelief. These twin pillars held up their unbelieving error. The same two pillars hold up modern unbelief of the Sadducee type. They misquote, misinterpret or mangle Scripture again and again. And they think of God as anything but Almighty — as just a man, though with larger powers than ourselves.
Their puzzle only works if you ignore both halves of the Lord's sentence. Take either half and the trap falls apart:
Suppose Scripture had said that people marry after they rise. Then their invented case might have been a real difficulty. If God had no power, the resurrection itself would be impossible.
Their weapon is an invented case. The same writer sees a fixed pattern in it:
All the apparent strength of unbelief lies in raising difficulties. It invents imaginary cases that do not apply. It reasons from the things of men to the things of God. The whole basis is false assumption... As for difficulties, what are they to the power of God, even supposing there were difficulties to man? What is beyond the power and the imagination of man is very possible to God.
Their question assumed that the next life just carries on this one, with the same ties. The Lord describes something else:
They were wrong, because they knew neither the Scriptures nor the power of God. The Lord reveals the state of those who are raised. That shows the plain ignorance and folly of the Sadducees' reasoning. It is a high and holy state where what is merely earthly will have passed away for ever. Things ordered by God and owned here will have passed away there. What is spiritual alone remains, and the body itself changed into suitable glory.
He said they did not know the Scriptures. Now He proves it from the part they honoured most — the five books of Moses:
The Lord does not quote the clearest Scripture about the resurrection. Here He does something much better. He appeals to what they themselves claimed to honour most... Everyone, their own conscience included, must allow that God is the God, not of the dead, but of the living. Therefore, if God calls Himself the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, it is not a meaningless thing... He speaks as one who was not only in relationship with them. He had made them promises, and those promises were never yet fulfilled.
The rebuke is not locked in the past. One writer ends with a question about our own reading:
With them we find mere human thought pushing into spiritual things. Its own poverty would make heaven poor as well. But they know neither the Scriptures — when did an unbeliever ever know the Scriptures? — nor the power of God. The Lord proves to them that the simplest sayings of God may hold what would enrich us for ever. And we do not find it there. Will we ever wake up and give the rich land God has given us the cultivation it needs?
- Two pillars. Not knowing the Scriptures is ignorance; not knowing the power of God is unbelief. Error stands on both.
- The method. Unbelief builds imaginary cases. It reasons from man's things to God's things. The whole structure rests on a false assumption.
- The power. What lies beyond man's power and imagination is possible to God. Admit His power and the difficulty is gone.
- The state. When the dead rise, earthly ties are gone for ever. What is spiritual remains, and the body is changed into suitable glory.
- The proof. God called Himself the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob long after they died. His promises to them were still unfulfilled. He is the God of the living, not of the dead.
For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as angels of God in heaven.
The Sadducees did not believe in resurrection, and they asked Jesus whose wife a woman would be if she had married seven brothers in turn. His reply says that risen life is not this life restarted, and it raises a question: what carries over from earth?
The men who asked it did not want an answer. One writer notes what lay behind the question, and how much the Lord's short reply overturned at once:
Ignorance, unbelief and sarcasm prompted this question. And what did He answer? He exposes both their ignorance of the Scripture and of the power of God… But the Lord does not try to prove to them that the Scriptures are true. He tells them instead that they are ignorant. Then He continues, "For in the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are like angels in heaven." In a few words the Lord confirms the truth of resurrection and the existence of angels, which they denied. He also shows that their unspiritual imaginings came only from their unspiritual hearts. Our present lowly body will not continue in resurrection, and earthly relations such as marrying and giving in marriage will cease there.
Another writer names their method. They "did not try to prove it false by Scripture, but they opposed it by ridicule" (Hamilton Smith).
Their mistake was to assume that if God raises the dead, He must hand people back exactly the life they had before.
They were limiting God to their own narrow ideas. They assumed that in resurrection God must give man back the same conditions we live under now… He tells them that in the resurrection marriage has no place. Just as among the angels there is no question of difference in sex, so it will be in resurrection life. For resurrection introduces a totally new condition of things.
One writer explains why marriage belongs to earth alone.
Death does not reign there; so marriage, by which the race is continued on earth, has no place on high. Further, they are equal to angels, and all of them are sons of God, being sons of the resurrection. The test case, so conclusive to those Sadducees against a resurrection, broke down at once. The condition needed to make it valid will not exist.
One writer marks out how far the likeness goes, and where it stops.
There is not a line in Scripture to say that the relationships of earth will continue in heaven. We shall not rise as husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and servants. In this respect we shall be like the angels. We shall not be angels, as some people wrongly imagine. We shall be like them only in being free from earthly relationships. The believer will enjoy privileges and heavenly relationships far above angels, and far above the passing relationships of this present life.
Jesus is not describing where the risen will live but what they will be.
In the resurrection everything changes. Marrying and giving in marriage are no longer in question — one is like the angels of God in heaven. The question here is not the position a person may be found in, but the character in which he exists.
Many hear this verse as a threat to the people they love. One writer answers that fear head-on:
Many minds now hold a monstrous piece of unbelief. They think that because earthly ties and relationships end in heaven, people will not be known there, or that our interest in one another will not last. The foolishness of the thought is easy to see. I know and love many who were once my masters or my servants on earth, and they know and love me. The relationship has passed, but thank God the mutual love and esteem our hearts formed in it have not.
What replaces the earthly tie is not emptiness but one greater bond. One writer puts it plainly: "Christ will be our only Bridegroom. We will need nothing more to be completely fulfilled, just as the angels are fully happy with their unique place in God's creation" (Various).
- Wrong measure. The Sadducees judged resurrection by the only world they knew. They boxed God inside their own narrow ideas.
- Wrong marriage. Marriage carries the human race forward on earth. Where death does not reign, that work is done.
- Right likeness. Believers do not become angels. They become like them at one point only: free from the relationships of earth.
- Right change. Resurrection changes not where you are but the character in which you exist.
- Right gain. The tie ends, the love does not, and Christ Himself becomes the one bond that leaves nothing wanting.
But concerning the resurrection of the dead, have ye not read what was spoken to you by God, saying,
The Sadducees denied any resurrection. They brought Jesus a riddle about a woman married to seven brothers in turn. He did not answer from the prophets. He answered from one sentence God spoke to Moses at the burning bush. Two things carry the weight of the verse: where He chose to read from, and His claim that these ancient words were said to them.
Jesus does not reach for the clearest resurrection passage in the Old Testament. He goes to the five books of Moses, the part these men honoured above all, and shows the resurrection is already there.
The Sadducees denied the resurrection. They put forward a case that in their own minds raised problems no one could answer... The Lord does not quote the clearest Scripture about the resurrection. He does something far better in the circumstances. He appeals to the very part they themselves claimed to respect above all. For a Sadducee, no part of Scripture carried the authority of the five books of Moses. So it was from Moses that He proved the resurrection.
God said these words to one man at a bush in the desert. Jesus tells a crowd standing there generations later that the words were addressed to them.
The patriarchs had died and left the world of men, but they were living in God's presence, and that guaranteed a resurrection at God's appointed hour... Notice too that the Lord spoke of the statement as "said to you." What God said to Moses holds good for everyone, and for all time.
Luke's account of this same moment names Moses as the writer. Matthew's wording points past him to God.
Luke shows clearly that the human author was Moses, while the parallel passage in Matthew 22:31 adds a word about the divine inspiration of the same words. And notice that it is the written word that this scripture gives authority to. God first spoke the words to Moses, but in their written form Scripture says God spoke them to the hearers, because He preserved them for the good of all.
The question is a rebuke. They did not lack evidence. They had failed to read what was already in their hands — and the writer turns the same test on us.
Christ was showing them that if they had studied these scriptures, they would have found the will of God on the very subjects they were asking Him about. If the Old Testament taught them anything on a subject, that was reason enough for them to accept the teaching as God's own. Is it not reason enough for you too?
The proof hangs on the word "am." A relationship stated in the present tense requires someone on the other side of it.
God says at the bush, "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob." But if He was in that relationship with them at the time, then they must exist for Him to be so. He could not be the God of the dead — dead in the Sadducee sense, meaning people who no longer exist at all. They must be alive in some sense, alive to Him, and so they are.
The Sadducees asked about bodies. The answer only reaches that far if a living spirit means a coming resurrection. One writer draws the link from what makes a person whole:
The bodies of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob have died, but their spirits live. That fact makes it necessary for God to raise them, because a person is not complete without spirit and soul and body (1 Thessalonians 5:23).
A second thread runs through the answer. God tied His name to three men He had made promises to, and they had not yet enjoyed them.
However low and beaten down the people had fallen, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob had not changed. The promises made to the fathers stayed sure, and the fathers were alive, to enjoy those promises later. What was in question was the word and the power of God.
William Kelly presses the point further:
He speaks as One who not only had dealings with them, but had made them promises that were never yet fulfilled. Either God must raise them from the dead to make good His promises to the fathers, or He was not careful to keep His promises. To deny the resurrection is therefore to deny the promises, and God's faithfulness, and in truth God Himself.
- Living text — God spoke at the bush to Moses, yet Jesus quotes the words as "said to you." What God said then holds good for everyone, for all time.
- Living authority — Jesus' "have you not read?" makes the Old Testament reason enough on its own. Had they studied it, they would have known God's will.
- Living God — "I am the God of Abraham" is present tense. He cannot be in relationship with someone who no longer exists.
- Living fathers — The bodies of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob died, but their spirits live. A person is not complete without body as well as spirit and soul, so God must raise them.
- Living promise — God attached His name to men He had made promises to. He must raise them to keep His word.
*I* am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob? God is not God of [the] dead, but of [the] living.
The Sadducees denied any resurrection. Jesus answers them with one line from Moses at the burning bush, and everything turns on its tense: God still ties His own name to three men who had lain in the grave for centuries.
Jesus could have quoted a plain resurrection text. Instead He chose the ground His opponents themselves trusted most.
The Sadducees denied resurrection... The Lord does not quote the clearest Scripture about the resurrection. He does something far better here: He appeals to the part of Scripture they themselves claimed to honour most. For a Sadducee, no part of Scripture carried the authority of the five books of Moses. From Moses, then, He proved the resurrection... But there is far more than that. He speaks as One who not only had dealings with them, but had made them promises that were still unkept. So either God must raise them from the dead to keep His promises to the fathers, or He is not careful to keep His promises. To deny the resurrection, then, is to deny the promises, to deny God's faithfulness, and in truth to deny God Himself.
The force of the whole answer sits in one tense.
What God said was, "I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob." And when He said this, these men had been dead for centuries. Had they, then, ceased to exist? No — for then God would have said, "I was their God," since He is not the God of the dead, of people who don't exist, but of the living. In this memorable answer the Lord proved that those who are dead to this present life live in the next. He also stressed that each of them keeps his own identity.
The word "dead" here carries the meaning the Sadducees gave it. (These writers quote an older translation; the ESV reads, "He is not God of the dead, but of the living.")
"God is not the God of the dead [that is, completely and forever gone, which was the sense the Sadducees He was arguing with gave the word] but of the living."
God did not merely mention these men. He named Himself by them.
If Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob had ceased to exist, could God have still taken their names — the name of nothing — to describe Himself to Israel? He might have said, "I am He who was with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, when they existed." Even that would have been a relationship completely unworthy of Him — the God of men who had no more than an animal life. God describes Himself by them; He is not ashamed to be called their God. Could He describe Himself by a dying animal, someone who did not exist at all when He called Himself their God?
The answer settles something about the body too.
Though the bodies of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob have died, their spirits live. So God must raise them in the end, for a person is not complete without spirit and soul and body (1 Thessalonians 5:23). The Lord therefore stressed a second time how great the error of the Sadducees was.
How long does that life last?
Our Lord quotes these words of Moses and adds, "God is not the God of the dead, but of the LIVING." That stresses that Abraham, Isaac and Jacob are alive now, long centuries after their bodies died. Nothing puts a limit on their existence.
The answer is simple, and it meets something we already know inside.
Now another kind of unbelief attacks our Lord — that of the Sadducees. Notice the beautiful simplicity of the wisdom of the mind of Christ. He brings them back to the burning bush and the voice of God that spoke from it, telling them that "God is not the God of the dead, but of the living." Our natural conscience tells us that He is the God of the living.
- Relationship — God said "I am," not "I was." Everything in the verse hangs on a living link between God and three long-buried men.
- Existence — That link proves they still exist. God cannot be in relationship with someone who is nothing, so the Sadducees' idea of death collapses.
- Resurrection — The link also demands their bodies rise. A person is not complete as spirit alone, so living souls guarantee raised bodies.
- Promises — The same link secures the promises God made to them and never yet kept. God must raise them, or fail His own word.
- You — Jesus argued from Moses, the book His opponents trusted most. The point lands on your conscience: the God who names Himself by His people does not lose them at death.
And when the crowds heard [it] they were astonished at his doctrine.
The Sadducees brought Jesus a riddle meant to make resurrection look absurd. He answered it from one line of Moses. Verse 33 records the effect on the crowd nearby — not on the questioners, but on the people listening in.
The men who asked the question denied any world beyond this one. What silenced them was God's own unchanging relationship to men long dead.
The Sadducees come to Him next and question Him about the resurrection. They think they can prove it absurd. They thought only of the things of this world, seeking to deny the existence of another. The people had fallen into a low and enslaved state. But the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob did not change. The promises made to the fathers remained sure, and the fathers were living to enjoy those promises later. It was the word and the power of God that were in question. The Lord maintains them with power and evidence. The Sadducees were silenced.
Jesus had named two things they did not know: the Scriptures and the power of God. Both failures grew from one habit of mind.
But they went wrong because they did not know the Scriptures or the power of God. They trusted their own minds instead of God's revelation of His own mind. They ignored His power to act beyond the reach of their senses. In the resurrection, the difficulty they raised would not arise. There are no natural relationships there. It is a spiritual state like that of angels, and it is the fruit of divine power.
The words the Lord quoted sound like a simple self-introduction. They carry the whole argument.
God had looked on His people and cared for them. He sent Moses out from the burning bush to be their deliverer, and He did it under that title, "the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob," and as that "I am." Sadduceeism could never have been the good news of that deliverance, nor the inspiration behind it. A living God in covenant with men meant life, not death; and if death existed, then there must be a life above it. So resurrection was the necessary completion of such a declaration: the hand God held out to man was not there to clasp the limp fingers of a corpse.
They never tried to answer Jesus from Scripture. Their weapon was mockery, and that method has a long history.
For the Christian, ridicule is a dangerous weapon. Anyone who uses it may find himself in strange company. It has always been the favourite weapon of the unbeliever who sets out to oppose Christianity. In Matthew 22:23-33 the unbelieving Sadducees come to the Lord to prove that resurrection is impossible. They invent a case which they imagined made resurrection absurd. They did not try to prove it false from Scripture; they opposed it by ridicule.
The astonishment in this verse is one of several reactions the Gospel writers record from that day, and it belongs to a pattern.
The Spirit of understanding is seen in His discerning the thoughts and motives of His questioners, and the Spirit of wisdom in His replies that silenced them. Those who received the answer about the tribute "marvelled at His answer, and held their peace"; the crowd that heard Him silence the Sadducees "were astonished at His doctrine" (Matt. 22:33).
Each Gospel preserves a different witness to the same moment, and together they show how completely the opposition collapsed.
Meanwhile the Sadducees were put to silence. No evangelist has recorded what they felt on receiving the Lord's reply. Matthew relates the effect on the crowd (22:33): "They were astonished at His teaching." Mark hints at the impression made on one of the scribes (12:28). Luke records what some of them said, and leaves us in no doubt of their verdict: "Teacher, you have spoken well" (20:39). The Lord had met both the Pharisees and the Sadducees on ground of their own choosing, and He defeated both.
Being impressed is not the same as being changed. The verse does not claim the second.
The crowd who heard these things were astonished at the Lord's teaching. No one could avoid its simplicity and force. The crowd were generally more fair-minded than the leaders. They recognised that what He said was right — whether or not it had any vital effect on their hearts.
The same gap between admiration and surrender still runs through people today.
How many admire the human greatness of Jesus of Nazareth, yet never receive Him, the Son of God, as Saviour and Lord by faith! Others are astonished at the uniqueness, greatness and literary value of the Bible. Yet they do not recognise it as the Word of God, which shows the way out of darkness and distance from God into His wonderful light.
- Attack. The Sadducees did not argue from Scripture. They invented an absurd case to make resurrection look ridiculous — and ridicule is still a dangerous weapon to pick up.
- Root. They did not know the Scriptures or the power of God. Both failures had one root: they trusted their own minds and allowed for no power beyond their senses.
- Proof. God's covenant name means life, not death — His outstretched hand was never meant to clasp the limp fingers of a corpse.
- Silence. The Lord met the Pharisees and the Sadducees on ground they chose themselves, and both went away defeated and silent.
- Astonishment. The crowd saw that His answer was right. But seeing is not believing, and admiring Jesus is not the same as receiving Him.